Am 08.12.2009 05:08, Martin Pool schrieb: > Yes, it is. However, that 'should' has to contend with the many other > things Launchpad should or could do next. I brought up the same subject today on an internal list and we thought to take the discussion here so that you know what we are talking about. I started out this way: > Especially in Translations we do get the request for internationalized > LP from time to time. Doing that would be a long-term effort as all > developers would have to be educated/reminded of how to write code that > can easily be internationalized and large parts of the existing code > would have to be converted. For the actual translation, though, we have > this great on-line tool with tons of translators ready to use it on LP > itself. ;) My opinion: I think I'd be worth it. Björn Tillenius replied: > Translating Launchpad is not only a technical issue. It's technically > possible, but is it really a good idea? In short, it is a good idea, if > it's done right. Translating all of Launchpad, presenting it in the > user's preferred language, isn't done right. There have been lots of > discussion of this subject in the past. To summarize it, I think the > conclusion was that some parts of Launchpad makes sense to translate > (like Answers, the front page, maybe Translations). Other parts don't > make that much sense to translate. For example, translating the bug > tracker isn't such a good idea, unless it's translated into the language > that the *project* is using. Translate it into the user's preferred > language, and you will get bug reports in the user's language. Jonathan Lange replied: > I haven't been present at as many of the discussion as you have, but > AIUI, the _reason_ it doesn't make sense to naively localize all of > Launchpad goes something like this: > > 1. Launchpad's reason for being is to make cross-project collaboration > possible and effective > 2. To collaborate, you need to communicate > 3. By far the easiest way to communicate is to speak a single, common language > 4. That common language is English, for the usual reasons. > > I think that's the right reason, and if it isn't, it's still a good reason. > > Less clear to me is why Answers, say, is a valid exception. Also, > although a single, common language is the easiest way to communicate, > there could be other, more difficult ways that might allow more people > to participate better in the Launchpad community.[1] I just can't > think of any right now. To which Danilo Šegan replied: > > Because it encourages support communities to organise themselves around > supporting a single language. I.e. you can register yourself to be a > support contact for Serbian for Ubuntu, in order to receive only > questions in Serbian (well, you receive slightly more, which is not my > favourite feature, but hey). > > As a matter of fact, I see questions coming from foreign language > speakers under certain languages even though questions themselves are in > English. I guess translated interface would make them realize that they > can really use their native language when asking a question, and that > registered contacts for *their* language will see it. > >> > Also, although a single, common language is the easiest way to communicate, >> > there could be other, more difficult ways that might allow more people >> > to participate better in the Launchpad community.[1] I just can't >> > think of any right now. > > It'd be nice to make use of the LP Translations database to do automatic > rough translation between languages. Kind of like google translate > does. > > Or, we could engage translations community in translating bug reports > and similar, if they are in a language other than English, thus further > improving the translations DB we have, and allowing better automated > translation in the future. I.e. a developer could just tag a bug > report, merge proposal or something else with 'needs translation to > English', and when someone shows up and provides that translation, bug > report/MP/... gets back into his pool of things to look at. > > As an alternative proposal, it'd be relatively easy to derive some > heuristics which only lets English through for the bug reports and such. > Perhaps even for other languages, based on LP translations DB, and allow > project maintainers to decide what languages they accept. > > It's not that hard to come up with workable solutions. It would require > focus and education, meaning time that we don't have. > > I think the potential is great: tapping into a much bigger community > than just English-speaking world. But, could we expect support from > translators in dealing with issues such as above (translating > user-submitted comments in LP)? I think we could, if done right. But, > doing it right is the hard bit. Björn also answered to Jonathan: > > Yes, that's a very good reason. I said that it might make sense to > translate a project's pages (including the bug tracker) into the > language the project uses (for example, if the project is Spanish only). > However, given your reason above, it doesn't actually make sense for us > to support it. If a project is in a non-English language, it will be > outside our eco-system. Other projects (for example Ubuntu) won't be > able to collaborate easily with that project, for example by forwarding > bugs to it. So it sounds like something we don't want to spend our time > on. > > >> > Less clear to me is why Answers, say, is a valid exception. > > Answers is a bit different, since it's highly project specific, and it's > geared towards helping application end-users mainly. A bug tracker is > meant to help the developers, and getting bug reports in different > languages will make the developers' work harder, since they have to > either find a way to translate the bug reports, or filter them out, > dissapointing the bug reporters. > > Answers is for a single project only, so you don't have the > cross-project collobaration aspect there. Answers is more like extended, > interactive, documentation for a project. Answers is a help to use the > project, and it's often easier to help a user in his own native > language. That said, naively translating Answer isn't good here either. > It only makes sense for the user to ask a question in his native > language, if there is someone at the other end being able to understand > the question, and answer the question in the very same language. We > shouldn't create a black hole for questions to go into. To which I couldn't resist but answer: >> However, given your reason above, it doesn't actually make sense for us >> > to support it. If a project is in a non-English language, it will be >> > outside our eco-system. > > *That* is a bold statement and I think the world is much bigger than we > tend to think it is. We have to watch out not to appear arrogant towards > non-English speakers here! "If you don't speak good-enough English, you > are not part of our community." is a hard thing to say to anybody. > > A community is always divided into sub-communities. In the case of > languages this is defined by who is a speaker of the language. Watch us > German-speakers, the Spanish-speakers and, of course, the > Portugese-speakers at the next event ... ;-) English will still be used > for interfacing with the rest of the world, so it is an interface > language but not the "language of the world" that its speakers like to > think it is. > > There is a big part of the world speaking Chinese. Another big part is > speaking Spanish. Portugese is a large community in itself, too, by the > size of Brazil alone. And the French speakers .... ;) > > So, I like the idea of being able to set a project language and allow > the project to organize their community in the language they prefer > because their user and developer base is mainly from that language or > country. A German tax program may not be of much use to anyone else. A > program catering some Chinese tradition is of no interest to people that > don't speak Chinese. > > Let's be as open-minded as the open-source world is in general and > realize that internationalization is something that people want. I > agree, that it has to be done right but saying "We don't want no foreign > speakers here" sounds very narrow-minded. Don't worry about Ubuntu not > being able to interface with them, they *do* have active Locos for a lot > of languages. > Martin Pool finally commented (on Björn first post): > This sounds a bit like trying to ban things that might be harmful. > Whereas in fact... maybe if we shipped this, it would turn out that > just a small comment in the appropriate language saying "please file > bugs in English" would be enough. > > Also, I wish this was happening on the public list. And so this ended up here ;) Henning
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